Vulnerability Information

Vulnerability Description

Orbit downloader [1] is vulnerable to a buffer overflow attack, which can be exploited by malicious remote attackers to execute arbitrary code. The vulnerability is due to Orbit not properly converting an URL ascii string to unicode. This can be exploited to execute arbitrary code by downloading a file from a specially crafted URL.

has a parameter cchWideChar which should be the "size, in WCHAR values, of the buffer indicated by lpWideCharStr". By supplying a download URL longer than 4096 bytes, if the download fails, MultiByteToWideChar will overflow the 8192 bytes buffer in the stack and write up to 0x2000 WCHARs (16384 bytes) to it, overwriting internal structures and enabling arbitrary code execution.

Report Timeline

2008-03-19: Core Security Technologies notifies the Orbit team of the vulnerability.

2008-03-27: The Orbit team asks Core Security Technologies for technical description of the vulnerability.

2008-03-27: Technical details sent to Orbit team by Core Security Technologies.

2008-04-03: Orbit notifies Core Security Technologies that a fix has been produced.

2008-04-03: CORE-2008-0314 advisory is published.

References

About CoreLabs

CoreLabs, the research center of Core Security Technologies, is charged with anticipating the future needs and requirements for information security technologies. We conduct our research in several important areas of computer security including system vulnerabilities, cyber attack planning and simulation, source code auditing, and cryptography. Our results include problem formalization, identification of vulnerabilities, novel solutions and prototypes for new technologies. CoreLabs regularly publishes security advisories, technical papers, project information and shared software tools for public use at: http://www.coresecurity.com/corelabs/.

About Core Security Technologies

Core Security Technologies develops strategic solutions that help security-conscious organizations worldwide develop and maintain a proactive process for securing their networks. The company's flagship product, CORE IMPACT, is the most comprehensive product for performing enterprise security assurance testing. CORE IMPACT evaluates network, endpoint and end-user vulnerabilities and identifies what resources are exposed. It enables organizations to determine if current security investments are detecting and preventing attacks. Core Security Technologies augments its leading technology solution with world-class security consulting services, including penetration testing and software security auditing. Based in Boston, MA and Buenos Aires, Argentina, Core Security Technologies can be reached at 617-399-6980 or on the Web at http://www.coresecurity.com.

Disclaimer

The contents of this advisory are copyright (c) 2008 Core Security Technologies and (c) 2008 CoreLabs, and may be distributed freely provided that no fee is charged for this distribution and proper credit is given.

PGP/GPG Keys

This advisory has been signed with the GPG key of Core Security Technologies advisories team, which is available for download at /legacy/files/attachments/core_security_advisories.asc.